Marcie90405
Aquarium Advice Newbie
Hi, my name is Marcie. I am an animal lover, and fish are my most recent additions to the "wild kingdom" I call my home. My sister gave me her 20 gal tank when she killed her 5th community of fish almost 2 yrs ago (she didn't know about cycling a tank and her then fiance didn't like to clean the tank. I now refer to him as the "fish mass murderer"!) At the time I had 1 red crowntail betta (Booger) in a 1 1/2 gal tank, and had lost 3 other bettas to old age over a few months time (I had them over 3 yrs each). I also have a rescued female fawn Boxer (Abby), a rescued female Turkish Angora (Molly), a rescued tortie domestic longhair (Gidget-aka Mommy kitty cuz she was pregnant when I rescued her) and two of her kittens (who are now 2 1/2 yrs old), a female calico longhair (Libby Ann) and a shorthair solid black male (Bubba Joe). We all live in sunny southern CA in Santa Monica.
My fish obsession took off after I obtained the tank from my sister, and I quickly over-stocked it with a pleco (Alf), a redtail black shark (Mork), 2 gold barbs (Lucy & Ricky), 2 cherry barbs (Fred & Ethel) and 3 Tiger Barbs (Janet, Chrisy and Jack). Thank goodness they were are small when I got them, and lived together very well until a few months ago when Mork started to get very territorial. He drove one of my tiger barbs crazy and she swam herself in circles to death. I quickly purchased another 20 gal tank, cycled it (because I found out that is what you are suppose to do via the internet) and relocated Mork to it with a new addition of Rosie, the pink kissing gourami and a new pleco, Alfie. My original pleco had gotten to 7 in and i gave him to the salesgirl at Petco for her 600 gal pond. About two weeks later I purchased 3 new tiger barbs, four mollies, 6 ghost shrimp (to get rid of some of the hair algae on my live plants) and 2 baby cherry barbs. The barbs & shrimp went into the barb tank and the mollies in with the shark tank. Again Mork got territorial, so again I bought another tank, this time a 10 gal. tank and off went Mork and Alfie to the new tank.
So then I decide that I have a mystery snail infestation, and go to the LPS to find out what I can do about it. I came home with Ellen, a clown loach baby (she is adorable! she dances when I come to the tank, eats all the snails she can find and freaks me out with playing dead and sleeping between the filter and the glass). Thank goodness I read about the clown loach behavior the first time she played dead on me! Ellen lives with the barbs now.
During this time, my beta Booger got sick afer jumping out of the net when I was cleaning his tank. It has taken a good month of daily PWC, fasting and lots of attention for him to come back to being a Booger! While he was sick, I decided that I should get another betta, seeing as I had a few extra small tanks. So in came Pretty Boy Floyd, a baby Delta Tail betta. When Ellen came, the ghost shrimp were transferred into the betta tanks.
Well as if this wasn't enough fish in my home, while looking for a used 30 gal tank for the large community fish colony I had grown to love, I saw an ad for a free "gold" fish and some other undetermined fish with tank on craigslist. I thought "perfect, my sister said she wanted another tank! and goldfish are hardy fish. So I answered the ad. When the guy contacted me, it turned out he was a few blocks from my home. I went over to get the fish and he hands me a tall tupperware container with two good size cichlids inside it with filthy water! Turns out that was their tank! I said "My God they are huge! that's not a goldfish!" An.d he looks at me with complete seriousness and says "Well its a "gold" fish." OY!! So off we went home, and again the changing of the tanks commenced. I bought a 30 gal tank that i have to fix a leak in a seal on, and a 40 gal tank, both of whih need to be cleaned and then cycled. I searched the internet for pictures of what the two fish I had taken home looked like, and after many arguements with my boyfriend about what they looked like, I am sure they are a blood parrot cichlid (about 4 in high and 5 in long) and a jack dempsey cichlid (about 6 in long). How those two survived until now with that guy, i have no clue.
needless to say, everyone is still alive (though Libby thinks that Grace and Will, the cichlids, would make great snacks. She is obsessed with watching them!!) including me!! I just wonder for how long!! Grace (a Blood Parrot cichlid) attacks Will (a Jack Dempsey cichlid) all the time and she looks as if she has fin rot on one of her fins, Alfie looks like he may have a fungus on his mouth, Mork has a scratch from going after Alfie and getting a barb, Will's fins are being held close to his body and he hasn't eaten because Grace goes after him whenever food is around, especially when I fed them shrimp prawns. She took what she didn't eat immediately and hoarded/guarded it in her cave. I had to take it out after an hour because I was afraid it would rot in there before she ate it, and she wasn't all that afraid of my hand. I thought for a moment that she was going to charge me! Two of my mollies look pregnant and I don't know when i should take them out of the tank to give birth. My Barbs, gourami, loach and chinese algae eater are so far not exhibiting signs of stress, but if I don't get the bigger tanks set up and cycled and everyone moved, I am sure its just a matter of time before they do.
While researching the pleco's fungus online, I came across the Aquariun Advice Community! My first thought was thank goodness! A place where I can ask questions about my fish and not look like a complete idiot! And someplace where I can trust those answering me, cause the people at the LFS will tell you anything to sell fish and supplies!! They LIE LIKE RUGS!!! Either that or they believe what the stores tell them to say and they are just as stupid as I am.
So here I am!! Anybody got any advice besides move those fish to bigger tanks?? I did PWC's in all the tanks yesterday, vacuumed gravel, changed filter carbons and put aquarium salt in all the tanks as directed for stress. I have antibiotic liquid fish food in the frig, and some other sort of medicine tablets that came with the 40 gal tank. Im afraid of hurting the pleco with medicines. Tomorrow I am moving the big tanks into the apartment and cleaning them, fixing the seal on the 30 gal. Ive got live bacteria to excelerate the cycling of the tanks, plus gravel that I will take from the established tanks.
My fish obsession took off after I obtained the tank from my sister, and I quickly over-stocked it with a pleco (Alf), a redtail black shark (Mork), 2 gold barbs (Lucy & Ricky), 2 cherry barbs (Fred & Ethel) and 3 Tiger Barbs (Janet, Chrisy and Jack). Thank goodness they were are small when I got them, and lived together very well until a few months ago when Mork started to get very territorial. He drove one of my tiger barbs crazy and she swam herself in circles to death. I quickly purchased another 20 gal tank, cycled it (because I found out that is what you are suppose to do via the internet) and relocated Mork to it with a new addition of Rosie, the pink kissing gourami and a new pleco, Alfie. My original pleco had gotten to 7 in and i gave him to the salesgirl at Petco for her 600 gal pond. About two weeks later I purchased 3 new tiger barbs, four mollies, 6 ghost shrimp (to get rid of some of the hair algae on my live plants) and 2 baby cherry barbs. The barbs & shrimp went into the barb tank and the mollies in with the shark tank. Again Mork got territorial, so again I bought another tank, this time a 10 gal. tank and off went Mork and Alfie to the new tank.
So then I decide that I have a mystery snail infestation, and go to the LPS to find out what I can do about it. I came home with Ellen, a clown loach baby (she is adorable! she dances when I come to the tank, eats all the snails she can find and freaks me out with playing dead and sleeping between the filter and the glass). Thank goodness I read about the clown loach behavior the first time she played dead on me! Ellen lives with the barbs now.
During this time, my beta Booger got sick afer jumping out of the net when I was cleaning his tank. It has taken a good month of daily PWC, fasting and lots of attention for him to come back to being a Booger! While he was sick, I decided that I should get another betta, seeing as I had a few extra small tanks. So in came Pretty Boy Floyd, a baby Delta Tail betta. When Ellen came, the ghost shrimp were transferred into the betta tanks.
Well as if this wasn't enough fish in my home, while looking for a used 30 gal tank for the large community fish colony I had grown to love, I saw an ad for a free "gold" fish and some other undetermined fish with tank on craigslist. I thought "perfect, my sister said she wanted another tank! and goldfish are hardy fish. So I answered the ad. When the guy contacted me, it turned out he was a few blocks from my home. I went over to get the fish and he hands me a tall tupperware container with two good size cichlids inside it with filthy water! Turns out that was their tank! I said "My God they are huge! that's not a goldfish!" An.d he looks at me with complete seriousness and says "Well its a "gold" fish." OY!! So off we went home, and again the changing of the tanks commenced. I bought a 30 gal tank that i have to fix a leak in a seal on, and a 40 gal tank, both of whih need to be cleaned and then cycled. I searched the internet for pictures of what the two fish I had taken home looked like, and after many arguements with my boyfriend about what they looked like, I am sure they are a blood parrot cichlid (about 4 in high and 5 in long) and a jack dempsey cichlid (about 6 in long). How those two survived until now with that guy, i have no clue.
needless to say, everyone is still alive (though Libby thinks that Grace and Will, the cichlids, would make great snacks. She is obsessed with watching them!!) including me!! I just wonder for how long!! Grace (a Blood Parrot cichlid) attacks Will (a Jack Dempsey cichlid) all the time and she looks as if she has fin rot on one of her fins, Alfie looks like he may have a fungus on his mouth, Mork has a scratch from going after Alfie and getting a barb, Will's fins are being held close to his body and he hasn't eaten because Grace goes after him whenever food is around, especially when I fed them shrimp prawns. She took what she didn't eat immediately and hoarded/guarded it in her cave. I had to take it out after an hour because I was afraid it would rot in there before she ate it, and she wasn't all that afraid of my hand. I thought for a moment that she was going to charge me! Two of my mollies look pregnant and I don't know when i should take them out of the tank to give birth. My Barbs, gourami, loach and chinese algae eater are so far not exhibiting signs of stress, but if I don't get the bigger tanks set up and cycled and everyone moved, I am sure its just a matter of time before they do.
While researching the pleco's fungus online, I came across the Aquariun Advice Community! My first thought was thank goodness! A place where I can ask questions about my fish and not look like a complete idiot! And someplace where I can trust those answering me, cause the people at the LFS will tell you anything to sell fish and supplies!! They LIE LIKE RUGS!!! Either that or they believe what the stores tell them to say and they are just as stupid as I am.
So here I am!! Anybody got any advice besides move those fish to bigger tanks?? I did PWC's in all the tanks yesterday, vacuumed gravel, changed filter carbons and put aquarium salt in all the tanks as directed for stress. I have antibiotic liquid fish food in the frig, and some other sort of medicine tablets that came with the 40 gal tank. Im afraid of hurting the pleco with medicines. Tomorrow I am moving the big tanks into the apartment and cleaning them, fixing the seal on the 30 gal. Ive got live bacteria to excelerate the cycling of the tanks, plus gravel that I will take from the established tanks.
